


Ploughshares Into Swords

by ChibiFrieza



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-09
Updated: 2014-02-09
Packaged: 2018-01-11 19:09:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1176800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChibiFrieza/pseuds/ChibiFrieza
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everything can be weaponised.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ploughshares Into Swords

**Author's Note:**

> Written after 5.17.

_When the Turks took Constantinople, they melted the bells into ordnance..._

-John Donne, _Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions_

 

He wakes quietly.

After Mary, he learned to come out of a nightmare without screaming; dreams of fire and smoke and blood, of death and demons, but his boys were in the next room, and Daddy’s the one who makes things better. Daddy doesn’t break.

So he wakes with desperate gasping, but no voice.

This is an older dream. He doesn’t bother wondering what brought it back; he’s been reverting, falling into his old training, his old habits. The pain’s still sharp, but he’s managing it, the only way he knows how. He’s becoming a warrior again.

He hasn’t dreamed of the jungle in years.

 

*

 

Sam is much older than Dean was the first time he held a gun. He’s still young enough that CPS would have John’s head on a plate for it if they ever found out.

Tin cans for targets, his brother at his shoulder coaching. John’s not the micromanaging type; if he can delegate, he will. He watches his boys critically, from a little distance. Dean is catching everything, how Sammy’s got one shoulder creeping up, how he’s not breathing when he should. Dean’s catching it, and Sammy’s fixing it.

He didn’t hesitate to put a gun in Dean’s hand. He hesitated with Sam, hesitated for years, because wasn’t it enough that he’d already turned one son into a weapon?

Sam’s hitting every can he aims at, now. “Ten more paces out,” John calls. His boys obey him instantly.

He’s not hesitating anymore.

 

*

 

Two demons, they could’ve handled just fine, but three’s pushing it, and things almost go pear-shaped and stay that way. This is one of those rare golden occasions when splitting up doesn’t end in catastrophe, though, and Dean manages to suprise the last one from behind while it’s got Sammy pinned against the wall and choking.

After, when the smoke’s cleared, Dean staggers over to make sure that Sammy’s still breathing, and Sam reaches up to make sure Dean’s ribs aren’t broken from getting thrown into that table. Dean hauls a long arm across his shoulders and they stumble across to the door, leaning heavily on each other, trying not to look at the bodies lying on the floor like spent shell casings.

 

*

 

The pawn shop is dingy and poorly lit. Underneath the four guitars hanging on the wall is a shelf full of jumbled electronics, and below that, a half-hearted display of tragically outmoded jewelry. Mostly gold, but...

“I’ll take that bracelet, and the earrings there.” They’re all tarnished, and they don’t match, not anything like. The pawnbroker can think Sam has terrible taste in presents if he wants to. Doesn’t matter. It’s just about time to start repurposing that little pile they’ve been amassing in the trunk, and every little bit helps.

He wonders, not for the first time, if there was silverware in his mother’s trousseau. If there was, he’s pretty sure he knows what happened to it.

 

*

 

When Leah convulses on the floor, the cypress branch through her heart erupting in flame and sparks, his mind is blank except for Castiel’s voice saying _true servant of Heaven_.

He’s been resisting the angels because he thought he had a choice. He thought it meant something, what he wanted, what he intended. The Michael sword was damn well staying sheathed.

 _True servant of Heaven_.

Later, he can hear Sam yelling over the roar of the engine as he pulls out of the parking lot. Sam is furious, and Dean gets it, but this is how it has to be.

When it comes down to it, the really important part of all this, the thing he wants most, is for Sammy to be okay. He _needs_ Sam to be okay. He thought if they both stood strong together, that would be enough, and they’d stop the Apocalypse somehow.

He thinks that kind of faith is sort of funny, now. It didn’t look like faith while he had it, but now that it’s gone, he knows. All that’s left now is damage control.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on [Livejournal](http://chibifrieza.livejournal.com/495787.html). Thank you for reading; comments are appreciated!


End file.
